Species
+

Spiraea japonica L.fil.

Japanese Meadowsweet, Japanese Spiraea, Japanese Spiraea (EN), Japanese meadowsweet

Climate known 3 photographs
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Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Spiraea japonica, the Japanese meadowsweet or Japanese spiraea, is a plant in the family Rosaceae.

Text from Wikipedia, “Spiraea japonica”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Spiraea

Spiraea, sometimes spelled spirea in common names, and commonly known as meadowsweets or steeplebushes, is a genus of about 80 to 100 species of shrubs in the family Rosaceae. They are native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere, with the greatest diversity in eastern Asia.

Text from Wikipedia, “Spiraea”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Rosaceae
Described by
L.fil.
Native to
China South-Central, China North-Central, China Southeast +4
Wild records
273 in range· 148 open

At a glance

Warmest month
27°C
Aug, mean day; nights 20 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1484mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jul 214 mm (CHELSA)
Light
16–32DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: a summer growing season, April to September in the northern hemisphere (April to September at the habitat, northern). Habitat rain 1484 mm a year, wettest July at 214 mm, driest December at 39 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 16 to 32 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -5.4 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Awayus japonicus (L.fil.) Raf.; Spiraea albiflora (Miq.) C.K.Schneid.; Spiraea albiflora (Miq.) Zabel; Spiraea albiflora Du Roi; Spiraea albiflora × japonica and 45 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: a summer growing season, April to September in the northern hemisphere (April to September at the habitat, northern).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the year's rain (1053 mm of 1484 mm) falls in April to September, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 20.2 °C against a yearly mean of 14.6 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: October to March.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 1484 mm a year, wettest July at 214 mm, driest December at 39 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1484 mm a year at the habitat, 1053 mm of it April to September. Wettest month July at 214 mm, driest December at 39 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 931 mm to 3115 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 16 to 32 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 16 to 32 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 13, the highest 90th-percentile month 37).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor -5.4 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -5.4 °C, the absolute minimum -15.1 °C, about 46 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 35.5 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 0.1 °C in January (across the envelope cells -8.9 °C to 4.2 °C), warmest day 26.9 °C in August (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -5.4 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 59 to 65% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 8 °C in Jan to 27 °C in Aug; mean night from 0 °C in Jan to 20 °C in Aug. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1484 mm of rain a year, most in Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 238 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -15.1 °C and the 99th-percentile day 35.5 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-20°-10°10°20°30°40°frost35.5° 99th-percentile day (undated)-15.1° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400500mm rainDLI 16–32RH 59–65 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 238 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C8 / 0–129 / 1–1413 / 5–1818 / 11–2221 / 15–2623 / 18–2926 / 20–3227 / 20–3123 / 18–2819 / 14–2314 / 8–1810 / 3–14
Night °C0 / -9–42 / -8–55 / -4–910 / 2–1314 / 7–1817 / 10–2219 / 13–2420 / 13–2416 / 11–2112 / 6–167 / 0–102 / -6–6
Rain mm52 / 10–10660 / 14–177100 / 25–199125 / 40–232159 / 87–336211 / 120–426214 / 147–415179 / 135–425165 / 84–414111 / 62–22669 / 24–13239 / 8–87
DLI17 / 14–2321 / 15–2925 / 19–3331 / 23–3632 / 27–3730 / 27–3432 / 29–3531 / 29–3325 / 22–2821 / 16–2517 / 14–2216 / 13–21
RH %60 / 55–6660 / 54–6660 / 56–6660 / 55–6662 / 57–6664 / 60–6865 / 61–6965 / 61–6964 / 61–6962 / 59–6761 / 58–6559 / 55–65

Each figure is the median across the 238 grid cells holding the 271 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 1195:5994 (30.225, 119.725). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -15.1 °C, 1st-percentile night -5.4 °C, 99th-percentile day 35.5 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 238 distinct grid cells holding the 271 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1195:5994 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 30.00_120.000, lapse-corrected -96 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 55 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeChina South-Central, China North-Central, China Southeast, Tibet, Japan, Taiwan, Myanmar· introduced: Great Britain, Ireland, Austria, Germany, Bulgaria, Romania, Baltic States, Central European Russia, West Siberia, Uzbekistan, Korea, Assam, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Illinois, Missouri, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., Vermont, West Virginia, California, Utah, Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Bolivia
Kew's description“shrub” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker31.37, 109.62 · in the densest population, 104 records (38% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 273 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 148 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 2780 km away. 1526 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 2 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 4° block of the 273 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Spiraea japonicaSpiraea japonica

Photographs: Logan Lucas, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIF; Dirk Lohse, CC BY-SA, via GBIF.

Photographs: iNaturalist did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Spiraea japonica, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Deposition of Particulate Matter of Different Size Fractions on Leaf Surfaces and in Waxes of Urban Forest Species
K. Dzierżanowski, Robert Popek, H. Gawrońska, Arne Sæbø (2011) · International Journal of Phytoremediation
Particulate Matter on Foliage of 13 Woody Species: Deposition on Surfaces and Phytostabilisation in Waxes – a 3-Year Study
Robert Popek, H. Gawrońska, Mariola Wrochna, S.W. Gawronski (2012) · International Journal of Phytoremediation
Fungal Planet description sheets: 1284–1382
P.W. Crous, E R Osieck, Ž Jurjević, J Boers (2021) · Persoonia - Molecular Phylogeny and Evolution of Fungi
Antiplatelet aggregation activity of diterpene alkaloids from Spiraea japonica
Ling Li, Yuemao Shen, Xiao‐Sheng Yang, Guo‐Ying Zuo (2002) · European Journal of Pharmacology
Phytotoxicity of Aqueous Ozone on Five Container-grown Nursery Species
Thomas Graham, Ping Zhang, Youbin Zheng, Michael Dixon (2009) · HortScience
The Chemistry and Biochemistry of Spiraea japonica Complex
Xiao‐Jiang Hao, Yuemao Shen, Ling Li, Hongping He (2003) · Current Medicinal Chemistry
Sensitivity of Five Container-grown Nursery Species to Chlorine in Overhead Irrigation Water
Diane Feliciano Cayanan, Youbin Zheng, Ping Zhang, Tom Graham (2008) · HortScience
Diterpene alkaloids and diterpenes from Spiraea japonica and their anti-tobacco mosaic virus activity
Yuan Ma, Xin-Ying Mao, Lie‐Jun Huang, Yi‐Min Fan (2015) · Fitoterapia
Antiplatelet and Antithrombotic Effects of the Diterpene Spiramine Q from Spiraea japonica var. incisa
Zhiqiang Shen, Zhihe Chen, Ling Li, Weiya Lei (2000) · Planta Medica

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Spiraea 9 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not asked
inat.photos.wild not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: not asked: 15 wild photographs already from the GBIF download
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: filled 2026-09-20
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 123 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.